


Moroccan Heat (The inevitable Remix)

by Occula



Category: U2
Genre: M/M, Remix, Sequel, fez - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-11
Updated: 2018-03-11
Packaged: 2019-03-29 17:25:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13931793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Occula/pseuds/Occula
Summary: Recording in Fez, after Adam and Susie broke up. Adam thinks things over and reminisces about his relationship with Bono. This was for a remix challenge on LJ; it's a remix ofMoroccan Heatby Clandestine269.





	Moroccan Heat (The inevitable Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Moroccan Heat](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/362688) by Clandestine269. 



> Originally posted on LJ July 12, 2007, for the remix challenge. Thanks to Clandestine for the scorching hot original story.

As I waited for the last glass of tea the old man was willing to give me – the staff cut off amenities in the early evening – I overheard Larry and Edge, talking in the small lounge off the lobby.

“It’s a fact, Larry. A proven scientific truism.”

“You can’t make me believe you’re cooler wearing that thing – black, no less, Edge! – than I am bareheaded.”

The man poured out my green tea with mint, raising the battered kettle high over his head with a flourish, spilling not a drop. I smiled, tipped, thanked, and headed for my retreat on the rooftop.

Morocco was like coming home.

I’d never lived there, and I’d been a thousand places since, but prior Moroccan memories were among my most cherished, and it was good to be back. Good to find Fez – or, more properly, Fes – unchanged and unchanging. There was something peaceful, something comforting about such a city’s ancient longevity amidst everything that had gone on outside, in the world and in my own life.

I love northern Africa, so Arabic and Mediterranean at the same time. I like the food, and the hot, sunny climate suits me as well, although it was less sweltering during this brief songwriting-and-festivalgoing jaunt than I remembered it.

Like many structures in the old city – Fes el Bali, Edge had informed us, the whole of which was some sort of historic site – our riad made good use of the rooftop. There were comfortable groupings of weathered outdoor furniture here and there, and the space was crowded with ornamental, shade-giving tropical plants, potted palms with strings of lights in them, and the like. I’d discovered this space early in our stay and immediately began to spend a lot of time up there, particularly at night when the heat abated.

They do use their limited space well in this city, I was thinking. As Bono said, the streets and buildings were constructed to a human scale, not to suit the automobile. Some of the “streets” were only a few meters wide. When I got up to stretch my legs, I could see over rooftops crowded with drying laundry, potted plants, and sitting areas. Only the minarets reached higher than three or four stories; one felt as though one was looking over a great deal of the old city, and on past to the long, low hills rising all around in the distance.

I was thinking, or, rather, trying to think. In actuality, I was taking advantage of atmosphere and solitude to brood.

I’d told them only that Susie and I had ended our relationship, that after so long we hoped to go on as friends, but that we’d reached an irreconcilable place. That was true, as far as it went. I was thinking over the rest of it.

Travel had so often been the factor that allowed me and Bono to be together. It was nearly impossible in Dublin, and not easy to hide from the entourage, either, but still. Venues and hotels, new cities and odd schedules, and a complete change of scene, they’d all conspired to allow our strange, enduring affair.

Until Vertigo. My relationship with Susie had grown more serious, and Bono and I tried, in our own ways, to be as ethical as we could. Without a word, he’d given me space, given my relationship space, quite graciously. During Vertigo, we hadn’t resumed. Brief public kisses were crumbs that sustained me – so little, but so much better than nothing.

Here I was, then, once again single; older and no wiser, merely grayer and heavier.

I’d happened to see a piece in one of the papers, earlier that spring, that speculated on my chances of marrying and starting a family at this late date. The article pointed out the difficulty of my knowing whether someone was interested in me for myself or for my public persona, my fame and fortune. It noted that someone within the organization might well be my best bet.

I couldn’t argue with that, except for the part about children. It was true, someone I worked with and saw often would tend to know me well, would be able to assess my real character and personality better than a new acquaintance could. Someone who’d known me for, oh, say, roughly thirty years would be ideal. Someone I loved well, someone whose very flaws were dear to me.

I hadn’t been able to settle down with someone else. That was the long and short of it. I hesitated to come right out and tell Bono so in those words; after all, he’d been able to find the kind of balance I couldn’t, and I didn’t want to seem to throw his marriage in his face. I’d never use that to hurt him, not even by accident if I could help it.

I knew it was foolish to be hesitant, even worried, after everything. More than anything, I didn’t want him to feel second best or taken for granted. Someone I dropped for a better prospect, then turned to again when that didn’t work out.

It looked like that’s what I’d done, perhaps, but it didn’t feel like it. It wasn’t that we’d fought or split up, Bono and I. We hadn’t ended it, we’d drifted and ceased. I’d tried, I _had_ loved her, and I’d meant to spend my life with her, but my heart was already spoken for. There was no dislodging him, he who occupied first place. It felt inevitable, didn’t it, that our time would come round again, somehow.

At that point in my reverie I heard the unmistakable flapping of sandals. I turned from the dim vista and had to smile; I’d just been thinking of the impossibility of detaching myself from him, and here he was. He’d been such a stunningly handsome young man that it never failed to amaze me how beautiful he was in maturity too. It was a different kind of beauty he wore now, but overwhelming nevertheless.

“There you are,” he said, smiling back, smelling of a recent shower and exuding some kind of fruity liquor. “Is this where you’ve been holed up?”

I nodded and spread one arm to the view. “They do a good sunset here, and it’s nice and quiet.”

He flapped over to the white wicker arrangement and perched in a chair. “Far more peaceful than Edge and Larry trying to figure out what’s wrong with Larry’s laptop.”

It was quiet again while I finished the last drop of tea and came to sit on the settee angled near his chair, and in that silent space I thought how good it was to see him deeply relaxed. He couldn’t relax on tour, hardly ever, not all the way – only once in a while, after –

I mentally cursed myself for going there. I hadn’t intended it, but I kept doing it.

“We did good work today,” I said, leaning back.

“All of us. I’m glad we came.”

“Of course – it was your idea.”

That got me another little smile. “Even Larry thought it was a good idea.” And then he was quiet again. Belatedly, I saw he’d come looking for me on purpose, with something to say. Suddenly I wished I still smoked, or at least that I had some tea left; I needed something to fiddle with, to mask my nerves. A distraction.

“It’s like being on tour,” he said after another pause. “Only without the tour.”

I didn’t know where he was going. “It’s like being on holiday without the holiday,” I ventured.

He sighed and leaned back, crossing his legs, at the same moment I leaned forward again.

“Bono, what is it?”

He looked like he could use a smoke too. Finally he asked, “How are you, Adam?”

“Fine,” I said, baffled.

“No, I meant – I thought, I’ve been so busy this spring, and we haven’t had much chance to talk. Since you and Susie broke up, I mean.”

Oh.

_I didn’t love her as much as I love you. I grew weary of perpetuating a fraud._

“It was extraordinarily lacking in drama,” I said. “Which was quite refreshing.”

“Still,” he pressed.

“I’m fine. Really,” I told him. “We both saw it coming for some time, and it … you could say it died a natural and peaceful death, surrounded by loved ones.” I didn’t know what to tell him, or how much, but I felt I was letting an opportunity slip away. “I don’t mean to sound callous or unaffected by it, but I’m not heartbroken either. Breaking it off was the right thing. I feel … I don’t know. Weary, maybe.”

I hadn’t meant to say that last, and it wasn’t exactly correct. I felt a lot of things, and weary was one of them.

_Weary, hopeful, skeptical, and cleaner, now. More honest._

He was thinking it over. We spoke at the same time. “Bono – ”

“Look, maybe – ”

We stopped and each tried to make the other continue. But since I really didn’t know what I was going to say, I won.

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you,” he said, which wasn’t exactly how he’d begun. “I’m glad if you weren’t hurt too badly, but I know it was a long time, a long relationship, and … you probably need some space, a resting period.” He stopped, unfinished, running his hand over his head. He’d always done that, long, short, or mulleted.

I watched him thinking, watched as his face showed compassion, impatience, and determination in succession, and in that moment, I knew. By the time he gathered up the threads of what he wanted to say and how he wanted to say it, enough to look at me again, he didn’t need to ask or tell me anything more. There was no hiding the quick, confident burst of happiness that had come over me, and his eyes lit up in response. We reached out at the same time and ended up squeezing one another’s hands, hard.

It no longer mattered exactly what he’d meant to say, but he went on, though we were both grinning like fools. “I was thinking how terribly inappropriate it was of me to bring it up … I wanted to wait, I _did_ try to wait, but I had to know.”

“Yes,” I said. That wasn’t all we had to say, but the rest could wait.

 


End file.
